President-elect Donald Trump announced one of the key roles in his administration today, picking former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee to serve as his ambassador to Israel.
The nomination comes as U.S. policy toward Israel’s war in Gaza played a large part in the 2024 election.
Trump was open about his unbridled support for the country’s offensive into the nation, while his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, struggled to balance her party’s backing of Israel with left-wing outrage over the massive death toll.
Huckabee’s nomination likely signals an all-out endorsement of Israel’s continued engagement and a lack of a peaceful resolution for Palestinians, especially given the former governor’s dismissal of the rights and existence of the population on his talk show.
Huckabee has spent the past decade as a media personality, hosting his “Huckabee” on Trinity Broadcast Network since 2017.
In an episode on June 21, 2024, Huckabee discussed campus protests supporting Palestine with Dr. Jonathan Schanzer, who said that the 2024 spring college protests had ties to Hamas.
“College kids,” Huckabee said in response, “are supposed to be smarter than this. But they’ve apparently been sold and brainwashed on the idea that Israel is an apartheid country, that it’s brutally attacking people who are Palestinian—which is a made-up term from 1962 and Arafat—how are they so effective in persuading these college kids?
Schanzer is a former Bush Treasury Department employee who worked for a number of pro-Israel lobbying groups. He said campus protests were funded by the American Muslims for Palestine, claiming the group’s leadership previously worked for charities with ties to Hamas.
The idea that the term Palestine didn’t exist before 1967 (Huckabee seems to have gotten the year wrong) is a common false trope cited by Israeli supporters that frequently circulate on social media.
“The first ever mention of an ancient land called Israel was by an Egyptian Pharaoh, Merneptah, 3429 years ago,” reads a meme that has made the rounds on Facebook. “The first ever mention of an ancient land called Palestine was by an Egyptian opportunist, Yasser Arafat, 57 years ago.”
The concept is factually wrong, with numerous references to Palestine in ancient texts.
However, proponents online of the theory claimed that the phrase was adopted in the wake of the 1967 Six-Day War, citing a poet who said, “On June 4, 1967, I was a Jordanian, and overnight I became a Palestinian.”
Others have said that prior to the Six-Day War, Palestinian people always referred to themselves as “Palestinian Arabs” and not Palestinians, saying the national identity had no purchase.
While Huckabee argued the term was invented by Yasser Arafat, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, other “debunks” of the concept said Arafat didn’t use the term, claiming he also referenced Palestinian Arabs and not Palestinians.
A version of the phrase was also uttered by Golda Meir, then prime minister of Israel on the second anniversary of the Six-Day War.
“There is no such thing as Palestinians,” she said in an interview.
But Huckabee’s comments aren’t the only time he’s doubted the existence of Palestine. On X, he used the toxic train crash in East Palestine, Ohio, to mock the country.
“Breaking wind from CNN! Reported that Joe Biden thought his trip to East Palestine, OH was actually a visit to the mythical land of ‘Palestine’ where Jew-hating =genocidal Hamas & Fatah rule and celebrate murder of Jews. Boy will he be surprised!” Huckabee wrote.
When discussing the conflict, even before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, Huckabee on X again referred to Palestinians using air quotes.
“Do you think the ‘Palestinians’ have been wronged by Israel? If you’re not afraid of some ‘inconvenient truth,’ I dare you to read what may be the best ever analysis,” Huckabee wrote in 2021, linking to a Times of Israel blog.
His show has repeatedly pushed harsh rhetoric toward pro-Palestinian protesters.
On Oct 29, 2023, Huckabee hosted a first responder from Israel who said that Palestine supporters “who are marching around the world now would be marching in 1939. There is no difference; these are Hitler supporters. Anyone who could support this kind of massacre is a Hitler supporter,” before going on to distinguish between Hamas and Nazis by saying that at least when Nazis were killing Jews they “wanted to go back to their families” and “have a normal life.”
Huckabee was floated for ambassador to Israel in 2016 when Trump first won, but turned him down.
Huckabee’s position will need to be confirmed by the Senate, which Republicans control in the wake of the 2024 election.
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